Video Games - a general discussion thread — Page 246

xhonzi said:

Hence the caution in my optimism.

But I'll read it.  I haven't paid $18 for a hardcover in a decade, so I'm not sure how long it will take me to get around to it.  Hopefully it appears at a goHastings sale soon after release.

EDIT: Didn't we (or at least you) talk about this book already once in this thread?  I can't find it.

EDIT2: I just noticed the cover art has changed to the picture I use as wallpaper on my laptop.  Sweet.

According to amazon (maybe a mistake?) the paperback has the exact same release date as the hardcover. I wish amazon did their release day delivery for 1 cent on books like they do on video games. Even though amazon's price is cheaper than the cover price for the paper back, it ends up being exactly the same once you add in shipping, and if you choose release day shipping, the paperback ends of costing more than the hardback. I guess I'll be paying my local brick and mortar B&N a visit on July 19th. It is about time I gave those poor people some of my business, typically I use them and their comfy chairs to thumb through a stack of books so I can go home and order the ones I want off of amazon; this might help alleviate some of my guilty feelings about that.

I did mention it somewhere on this site before, but you never acknowledged it or said anything, which surprised me since you seem to be the only other person in the universe as into Bioshock as I am (or perhaps more accurately, in the same kind of way I am).

I've never read anything by John Shirley, but a quick amazon search to see the sort of stuff he writes and a sifting through reviews of his books has actually made me quite optimistic about this thing. Sounds like he works well with this sort of material.

An unfortunate side effect of discovering that book was that amazon showed me a few "recommendations" on my home page, one of which was a Bouncer action figure with color changing LED eyes. I've always kind of wished I'd bought the original Bioshock special edition because of the Big Daddy statue (yes, the one that had a tendency to break during shipping), so the idea of finally having my very own plastic representation of one of the most amazing things ever dreamed up by the human imagination was a bit too much to take... so yeah, I am $20 bucks poorer than when I woke up this morning...

xhonzi said:

I probably only missed being in the target audience of Pokemon by a couple of years, but it's firmly fixed in my mind as something for "kids".  The idea that there are people I generally consider my peers that were/are into Pokemon makes me feel like I must be the old fuddy duddy that needs to find "people my age" (read: Frink) to hang with.

Though Frink is probably thinking the same thing about me.  ;)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pok%C3%A9mon

Pokémon (????, Pokemon^?, English pronunciation: /?po?ke?m?n/ poh-kay-mon^[1]) is a media franchise published and owned by the video game company Nintendo and created by Satoshi Tajiri in 1996.

I was 23...so there you go.

xhonzi said:

 

I think that same Big Daddy will be mine next month.  And maybe a flying delorean.

I also have some Toys'R'Us credit... They have this "Subject Omega/Little Sisters/Life Size Wrecked Rabbit Splicer Mask" set on clearance there for $30.  I've been waiting for it to hit $20 or even $25.  I've probably spent $20 in gas just stopping by week to week.  :(  I should probably just get it.

Oh man! I really want that Splicer Rabbit mask!

I saw a video of that Big Daddy figure with the LED lights on Youtube. Man, is it cool looking. The lights look fantastic! I almost bought the original Big Daddy figure when it was first released, but didn't want to blow $35 bucks at the time, now I am really glad I didn't because I wouldn't be able to justify this one with the lights.

Do you remember my Big Daddy doll I made and posted here? Well, I gave it to a good friend of mine as a gift a short while later, then I decided I still wanted one for myself so I bought the officially one... but it just doesn't look right. The "rubber bands" are made out of felt and the baseball head doesn't even try to pretend to be a real baseball and its weight it really weird. It hangs weird and it sits weird. So, I have decided it is time to produce myself another one from scratch. Though I am not sure how committed to the effort I am yet. If I get anywhere with it, I'll post results.

xhonzi said:

Excitement (Holy Carp!  This light up Big Daddy is AWESOME!)
Relief (And it's a metric tonne less than those ebay ones I didn't buy!)

And hopefully soon:

The-Buying-it-Step (This is where I buy it)

 

Right now there are a bunch on amazon for just under $17 plus $4.99 shipping. The one I just bought this morning came in at a total of $22.50 with shipping. Much cheaper than I ever imagined paying for a Big Daddy figure.

And since I bought the Toys R Us exclusive Big Sister/Little Sister combo pack back when the game first came out (bought two actually, opened one and just sold the other for $40 on amazon, adding to my justification of buying the Big Daddy) I already have a little sis to go with him.

Interesting... I thought of making one when I heard you'd made one... To keep up with the C3PXs and all... but I never followed through.  I thought I might pick up the official one, but based on your review I guess I won't.  I guess time will tell if I have the committment to make one.

Send me the instructions you decide to use this time.

I mean, he isn't that bad. But since it is a toy made out of common household Frankensteined together, a replica of one with plastic coated wires, fake thumb tacks in a fake baseball and felt for rubber bands just doesn't come off near as cool when you've already owned a much more authentic Frankensteined together one from all the real parts.

I actually never use instructions for things like this, I just pull up a picture on my computer screen and get to work.

xhonzi said:

So, that weekend is coming up in about a month.  And while I have things to play, I certainly don't have a BioShock....  And I don't think I have anything staying up all night to play.  I should probably start FallOut3... but there's no way I would finish it in a week of staying up all night.  :(

Actually, since you haven't played Fallout 3 yet, I'd say that is the perfect and most worthy game for your once a year opportunity. The campaign probably takes a little bit less time to beat than Bioshock if you focus just on it, which is easy to do (each time you finish a story related mission it will give you a map marker to the next one just keep following that map marker and it can be as linear of an experience as you want it to be), then you'll have plenty of little short missions to focus on later as you get the time. It was the first big open world game I ever played, so it was kind of intimidating to me, after I finished the campaign I felt more comfortable with the world and the game mechanics in general and spent plenty of time exploring.

You can't go wrong with Fallout 3.

If you want to go for 100% achievements (it is a fairly easy but also rewarding game to get full achievements in), then make sure to look up the two missable Bobbleheads before playing. One of them is in the Enclave base toward the end of the campaign, and once you beat that section you can never go back. I had to start a new game because I missed this one bobblehead in order to get the achievement for collecting them all. The other missable one isn't as easy to miss.

xhonzi said:

xhonzi said:

Please watch the trailer to Prey 2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5h2TkpFEsn8 (Watch in HD)

I didn't care for the little of Prey 1 that I played, so I wasn't terribly interested in Prey 2.  The first 30 seconds of this trailer hit earlier this year which made me say an actualTM: "What is this I don't even."

This doesn't just look like it might be a good game, it looks like decent Science Fiction to boot.  Check it, check it, check it out.  (And Funk's Your Brother).

Just wanted to bump this.  Did anyone else watch this?  I was quite impressed.

But it's anonymous!

Back on topic please.

This thread is about Bioshock.

Pfft.

xhonzi said:

There's anonymous and then there's anonymous.  I clearly said that it was the trailer to Prey 2.

But does that mean it is correct?

For example, enjoy this link to Jared from Subway doing an imitation of Forrest Gump.

Another recommendation for Fallout 3.

I bought the collector's edition of Bioshock with the Big Daddy paperweight. Then when I found out there was a matching 2K Little Sister I was forced to pay an outrageous sum on eBay to get that too.

She is hiding an EVE hypo behind her back, but the thing I like most about this is the piece of tiled floor she is standing on.

I've hardly even played the game... I loved the demo but the game seemed to go straight on the backburner and never came off.

*goes to reinstall Bioshock*

I used to want that set so badly!

When the little sister first came out and was fairly inexpensive I wanted to buy one so I'd have it to go with my Big Daddy when I finally found one at a reasonable price, but that line of thinking got me on a big search for a Big Daddy and ended with me feeling frustrated that I couldn't find one for under $80 bucks even when it had a broken or missing drill/tank and deciding to give it up completely.

This new Bioshock kick I find myself on finally got me to get around to watching the E3 stuff for Bioshock Infinite. Personally, I still think it looks very promising. I like the idea of an unconnected continuity with similar themes (much like System Shock to Bioshock).

However, I still think a part three to Bioshock featuring my splicer island idea would have been amazing. Would be great to hear the story of a group that foresaw Raptures woes and left sometime before everything fell apart to make their own utopia on a nearby island, only to run into their own problems. I imagine a bit of an Island of Dr. Moreau mixed with a bit of Lost and a lot of Bioshock. Would have been brilliant. 2K needs to hire me.

Now that I am dreaming of the existence of my Bioshock 3, I've realized that we never see any animals in Rapture other than fish and dead kitties and the like.

Since this group that banded together and left Rapture for their own utopia without the fanaticism of Andrew Ryan chose a large island filled with its own population of wild life, we could have corals full of spliced up ostriches and wild boar. Much like with genetics today, they could have been using splicing to make their livestock grow faster, to have more tender and better tasting meat, etc. This is a theme that the original Bioshock stayed away from, focusing instead only on genetic manipulation in humans. Imagine being attacked by a stampede of spliced ostriches!

You could also wander into some laboratory filled with spliced bunnies and other monstrosities.

With a little creativity, it wouldn't be hard to find a new take on harvesting Adam. I'd like to thing this group started off more moral and the idea of using little girls as hosts was part of the reason for their departure, and so they've found a more clever and perhaps more complicated way of harvesting Adam from their slugs. Obviously this has a potential to hard to morality aspect of the game, but I still think they could come up with a fresh new take on the moral dilemma to replace the old "Harvest or Rescue" from the first two games. This game would have to be a drastically different take on everything from Bioshock. No rehashes, everything would need to be rethought up and re-conceptualized from the ground up.

Oh man, this game is so unbelievable amazing in my head! Can't wait for it to come out! (Too bad it never will) Suddenly Bioshock Infinite looks slightly lame...

Which leads me back to rehash a resent statement I made about how there is "nothing new under the sun" in regards to video games and nothing to get excited about anymore. Bioshock Infinite is the most interesting looking thing in all of E3 in my humble opinion, and it really looks just like Bioshock in the sky. I am sure I will play it an enjoy it, but with a release date being over a year away, I don't see much to get excited about it yet; it doesn't look like anything ground breaking or original which was a key trait to the original Bioshock.

Coming this year we have Gears of War 3, Modern Warfare 3, F.E.A.R. 3, Resistence 3 (wow, that is a lot of threes), Elder Scrolls V, and a bunch of other things that are rehashes of things that have already been done. Sure, they'll all have new features and no doubt old features will be vastly improved, but essentially they'll be nothing really that new.

xhonzi said:

 

I'll admit I haven't caught up on all of the E3 stuff.  I'm still a little surprised they're hawking it so hard when it's still a release for next year.  Maybe even late next year.  ?

Has anything you've seen made you think it won't feature anti-caricatured-extreme-patriotism theme?  Or at least, not in a way that won't come across as condescending to actual/literal patriots?

I agree, they seem to be pushing the hype really hard for a game that has a release date of December 2012.

I never actually quite understood your concern about the Patriotism thing to begin with, but no, nothing I have seen has given me that indication. However, I tend to feel patriotism can be, and often is, a really dumb thing. I am the guy who has refused to say the pledge of allegiance since he was in the fourth grade because it struck him as weird to force children to express their undying devotion to stuff they may not believe in or even understand on a daily basis. 

Ken Levine kind of explained the premise of the floating city as a means to fly around the world and show everyone how great and wonderful the US is. This brand of extreme patriotism (and the idea of American exceptionalism taken to an extremist levels) rub me the wrong way to the extreme, so I am not going to be offended if they tear that sort of behavior apart.

But you and I might be coming from very different angles on this.